Battery-powered accessories such as headlamps, tail lamps, and the like have been designed for use with bicycles since at least as early as 1900. Most battery-powered accessories designed for use with bicycles incorporate the battery and accessory in a single integrated unit such as a headlamp or tail lamp. In these specific applications, the integrated unit including the battery holder is generally designed for a specific mounting location on the bicycle (such as the handlebar for a headlamp), and as a result is generally designed for mounting only at that specific location. For example, handlebar-mounted, battery-operated headlamps are very common and typically incorporate a mount that can only be secured to a tube having a diameter in the limited range of 20 mm to 30 mm which are the typical diameters for bicycle handlebars. Furthermore, it is not possible to use the batteries in a typical integrated headlamp or tail lamp to power any separate device. Some bicycle accessories have separate battery holders that are mounted separate from the powered accessory—again most common are headlamps and tail lamps. Some of these separate battery holders are designed to mount to the frame tubing of the bicycle. These previous devices, however, are limited in where they can be mounted on the bicycle and/or the types of bicycles to which they can be mounted.
U.S. Pat. No. 559,801 to Hoffman, the disclosure of which is expressly incorporated herein in its entirety by reference, shows a handlebar-mounted headlamp with a separate battery holder. The battery holder mounts using straps that are specifically designed for fitting the corner between the top tube and head tube of the bicycle frame. This was a convenient mounting location for a headlamp on a bicycle of that time. Today's bicycles feature a wide range of frame designs and geometries, such that this type of battery holder mount would not be assured to fit on all modern bicycles.
U.S. Pat. No. 1,439,430 to Lyhne, the disclosure of which is expressly incorporated herein in its entirety by reference, shows a weatherproof battery holder for bicycles that clamps to a frame tube. The invention includes a metal mounting strap permanently attached to the device. The battery holder is generally round and is strapped to a generally round bicycle tube. No provision is described for preventing the holder from sliding or rotating or twisting out of place after being attached, which is an inherent problem of clamping two round (cylindrical) objects together parallel to each other. Also, no provision is described for attaching the holder to bicycle frame tubing of significantly different sizes.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,339,060 to Braida, Jr., the disclosure of which is expressly incorporated herein in its entirety by reference, shows a battery holder that clamps to a frame tube with a metal adjustable-length clamp. However, the portion of the holder that contacts the bicycle frame is curved to match what is described as a “typical” bicycle frame tube. This overcomes some of the mounting limitations of the Lyhne invention. However, modern bicycles have a wide range of frame tube sizes and shapes, so this battery holder will not fit many modern bicycle frame tubes as it must inherently be curved to fit a particular diameter of frame tube. The holder is also designed to hold a single large, square 6 volt lantern battery which is far too large to be mounted in many of the locations such as, for example, the hub of a wheel, between the rear wheel and the bicycle frame tube, on a rear stay, or on the handlebar.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,597,031 to Tsuyama, the disclosure of which is expressly incorporated herein in its entirety by reference, shows a clamp with an integrated strap allowing a range of tubing sizes to be clamped. However, the strap must be long enough to accommodate the maximum tubing size to be attached, and this means when a significantly smaller tube is attached the excess strap will flap around or require bundling. Alternatively, the excess strap can be cut off, precluding any later re-attachment to a larger tube.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,572,249 to Bailey, the disclosure of which is expressly incorporated herein in its entirety by reference, shows another type of integrated strap which is in common use today, and having similar limitations to the Tsuyama design. This strap also has a small size of contact area between the device and the mount, so it is only suitable for attachment of relatively small and light weight items.
U.S. Pat. No. 626,627 to Middlekauff, the disclosure of which is expressly incorporated herein in its entirety by reference, shows a battery holder and lamp which connects to a bicycle with a clamp. The clamp is not well described, but appears to be a C-clamp. This type of clamp can only fit a limited range of tubing sizes (typically within 20% of the design size). Fitting additional smaller diameters requires an insert be placed between the tubing and the clamp. Fitting additional diameters larger than the design size is not possible with this type of clamp.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,736,921 to Zane, the disclosure of which is expressly incorporated herein in its entirety by reference, shows a type of C-clamp which is commonly used today for bicycle accessories. This type of clamp requires screws and nuts to attach to the frame, which can be relatively expensive. Also, this type of clamp can only fit a limited range of tubing sizes. This attachment method is widely used despite its limitations. For example see U.S. Pat. No. 6,446,922 to hie and U.S. Pat. No. 6,431,422 to Moore, the disclosures of which are expressly incorporated herein in their entireties by reference, that show other uses of this type of clamp with a bicycle accessories.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,332,183 to Kagayama, the disclosure of which is expressly incorporated herein in its entirety by reference, shows a style of clamp that is also common today for mounting headlamps with integrated batteries to a bicycle handlebar. This type of clamp, like the c-clamp discussed above is limited in the range of tube sizes to which it can be attached, and requires inserts to fit smaller tube sizes.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,568,838, the disclosure of which is expressly incorporated herein in its entirety by reference, shows a handlebar-mounted light with a cam-locking clamp. This type of clamp is expensive and can't accommodate as wide a range of tube sizes.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,597,225 to Davis, the disclosure of which is expressly incorporated herein in its entirety by reference, shows a battery holder designed to fit the water-bottle holder of a common bicycle. This is convenient for some applications, however it generally requires that the battery be nearly as large as a common bicycle water bottle and prevents free use of the water-bottle holder for holding water bottles. Water bottle holders are also present on most bicycles in only one or two locations, which may not be the desired location for a battery or other accessory—for example, this location may require a considerably longer wire to reach the powered device.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,286,982 to Tashiro and U.S. Patent Publication Number 2009/0261134 A1 to Tetsuka et al., the disclosures of which are expressly incorporated herein in their entireties by reference, show battery holders that mount to bolt holes in the bicycle frame. Thus the mounting location is limited to available bolt holes in the frame.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,135,229 to Modurkay, the disclosure of which is expressly incorporated herein in its entirety by reference, shows a bicycle wheel light with hub-mounted battery holder. The round battery holder is strapped to the round hub in a way which does not fix the battery holder from rotating and sliding around.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,121,305 to Deed, the disclosure of which is expressly incorporated herein in its entirety by reference, shows a bicycle wheel light with hub-mounted battery holder. The battery holder is of a clamp-on type so it can only be secured to a limited range of hub diameters.
While these prior accessory mounts may be effective at mounting to a specific location of a specific bicycle, they are not effective at attaching accessories to a wide range of different diameters and shapes of components of a wide variety of different bicycle frames and wheels. Accordingly, there is a need in the art for an improved bicycle accessory mount.